A German magazine has come in for fierce criticism after it purported to publish an interview with Michael Schumacher. Die Aktuelle , which typically trades in salacious gossip, printed a front page bearing the words “Michael Schumacher, The First Interview, World Sensation”, along with a picture of the seven-time World Champion. In much smaller type, the magazine also printed the words “It sounds deceptively real”, indicating that the so-called interview was actually created by an AI chatbot. Schumacher sustained severe head injuries in a skiing accident in Meribel in December 2013. The German has not been seen or heard from in public since then, and any information as to his condition remains a closely-guarded secret. Reaction in Germany to the article has been overwhelmingly negative. Writing in Ubermedien , German media expert Boris Rosenkranz was particularly scathing. “This story here is a particularly remarkable cheek, even for ‘Die Aktuelle’,” he wrote. “You can’t hide the calculation to give the readership the feeling that Michael Schumacher might be talking about his physical condition,” he added. ‘Everybody misses Michael, but Michael is here’ Schumacher’s wife Corinna, as well as their children Mick and Gina, chose to publicly speak about the skiing accident for the first time in the 2021 Netflix documentary film, Schumacher . “Of course, I miss Michael every day,” Corinna said. “But it’s not just me who misses him: the children, the family, his father, everyone around him. “Everybody misses Michael, but Michael is here. [It’s] different, but he’s here, and that gives us strength, I find.” Corinna also spoke about the treatment that Schumacher continues to receive at home. “We do therapy, we do everything we can to make Michael better, and to make sure he’s comfortable, and to simply make him feel our family, our bond. And no matter what, I will do everything I can. We all will. “We’re trying to carry on as a family the way Michael liked it and still does and we are getting on with our lives. ‘Private is private’, he always said. “It’s very important to me that he can continue to enjoy his private life as much as possible, Michael always protected us, now we are protecting Michael.”
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